A year or so earlier, in an unwarrantably self-deprecating paragraph of a letter to her brother Buddy, she had referred to her own figure as...

J.D. Salinger -- Franny and Zooey

Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came.

Abraham Lincoln -- Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address

Poirot raised a deprecating hand.

Agatha Christie -- Murder On The Orient Express

General hubbub, mostly sympathetic to the flower girl, but deprecating her excessive sensibility.

George Bernard Shaw -- Pygmalion

Lee smiled, waved a deprecating hand.

Michael Shaara -- The Killer Angels

He smiled his usual smile, half deprecating, half shy and embarrassed, but I felt I had given him pleasure with what, in the present situation, was my naive wish to help him.

Wladyslaw Szpilman -- The Pianist

"O no, sir!" cried the girl, following him. "Really, sir, I wouldn’t take it.""Christmas-time! Christmas-time!" said Gabriel, almost trotting to the stairs and waving his hand to her in deprecation.

James Joyce -- Dubliners

...said the landlady, swinging her long earrings with deprecating modesty;

Thomas Hardy -- The Mayor of Casterbridge

Poirot shook his head, as though deprecating the other’s jesting tone

Agatha Christie -- Early Cases Of Hercule Poirot

Padre Jose put up his hand deprecatingly as if he were trying to indicate that he was not there,

Graham Greene -- The Power and the Glory

"You didn’t believe me?" She smiled, deprecating.

Hal Borland -- When the Legends Die

That’s when the self-deprecating voice in my head kicked in.

Ransom Riggs -- Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

His father is self-deprecating and funny.

Katja Millay -- The Sea of Tranquility

They instinctively liked all people but had been conditioned to dislike and deprecate blacks.

Pat Conroy -- The Water is Wide

It’s such a strain on the voice," Cordelia says with a deprecating smile, as if she is projecting and straining her voice all in the line of work.

Margaret Atwood -- Cat’s Eye

My prickly feelings began to relax a little, too, listening to Jamie’s stories, all humorous and self-deprecating.

Diana Gabaldon -- Outlander

He was absent-minded and kind; he was neglectful and muddle-headed and self-deprecating and gentle; often he didn’t hear the first time you spoke to him, or even the second time; he lost his glasses, mislaid his wallet, his keys, his dry-cleaning tickets, and was always calling me downstairs to get on my hands and knees with him to help him search for some minuscule fitting or piece of hardware he’d dropped on the floor.

Donna Tartt -- The Goldfinch

’It just occurred to me you might be interested,’ he would say with a deprecating little laugh whenever he produced a new fragment.

George Orwell -- 1984

Collette had told her it was a stupid habit, this self-deprecating clowning around with which Pari tried to mask her nervousness around men she was attracted to.

Khaled Hosseini -- And The Mountains Echoed

I learned, from the views of social life which it developed, to admire their virtues and to deprecate the vices of mankind.

Mary Shelley -- Frankenstein

And she was fond of saying, in deprecating some item, "I couldn’t write a line with that in the house."

Toni Morrison -- Song of Solomon

Her beautiful eyes glanced askance at her husband’s face, and her own assumed the timid, deprecating expression of a dog when it rapidly but feebly wags its drooping tail.

Leo Tolstoy -- War and Peace

"I beg your excellency’s pardon," interposed the steward in a deprecating manner, "for venturing to observe that it is already two o’clock."

Alexandre Dumas -- The Count of Monte Cristo

Marilla and Matthew looked at each other deprecatingly across the stove.

Lucy Maud Montgomery -- Anne Of Green Gables

He pursued his theme, however, without noticing my deprecation.

Charlotte Bronte -- Jane Eyre

But the other made a deprecating gesture.

Stephen Crane -- The Red Badge of Courage

Master Cruncher (who was in his shirt) took this very ill, and, turning to his mother, strongly deprecated any praying away of his personal board.

Charles Dickens -- A Tale of Two Cities

D’Artagnan, who understood that it was to him this compliment was addressed, approached, assuming a most deprecating air.

Alexandre Dumas -- The Three Musketeers

The Jondrette, touched by his compliment, deprecated it with the affected airs of a flattered monster.

Victor Hugo -- Les Miserables

"Oh, well," she said deprecatingly.

Margaret Mitchell -- Gone with the Wind

Total strangers saw fit to deprecate him, with the result that he was stricken early with a guilty fear of people and an obsequious impulse to apologize to society for the fact that he was not Henry Fonda.

Joseph Heller -- Catch-22

Alex’s chin came up a notch, as if she was ready for Lacy to make a deprecating comment about her affiliation with the bad guys.

Jodi Picoult -- Nineteen Minutes

As Duncan dared not retort upon his accuser by reminding him of his own premeditated treachery, and disdained to deprecate his resentment by any words of apology, he remained silent.

James Fenimore Cooper -- The Last of the Mohicans

The barman waved back deprecatingly.

Ernest Hemingway -- A Farewell to Arms

The evil principle deprecated in that religion is the orderly sequence by which the seed brings forth a crop after its kind.

George Eliot -- Silas Marner

"And who is Sordo?" the other asked deprecatingly.

Ernest Hemingway -- For Whom the Bell Tolls

He shrugged deprecatingly.

Stephenie Meyer -- Eclipse

But Bernard would not be cheered; without answering, without even looking at Helmholtz, he went and sat down on the most uncomfortable chair in the room, carefully chosen in the obscure hope of somehow deprecating the wrath of the higher powers.

Aldous Huxley -- Brave New World

The next day he received two more complaints, one from a man who came in diffident deprecation.